As Digital Learning Coordinators, there is a vast amount of services we can offer to support staff and students. We are able to deliver professional development to staff on a wide range of digital literacy and educational technology topics.

At Apex High School, for instance, we deliver professional development monthly during staff planning time called Power Half Hour. This past year, the topics have been Canvas, artificial intelligence (in education), Canva, and podcasting. Each of these sparks new conversations about integrating these into their classroom to enhance instruction.

If you are a school media specialist and would like to schedule us to come to your school and present on these topics or others we would love the opportunity.

(Quickly and easily) import your Google Slides presentation into Canva!

One of our favorite things to do as DLCs is to support technology integration in the classroom with students. Recently, we have had the pleasure of supporting the Coding club at Oak Grove Elementary School and the Podcasting club at Olive Chapel Elementary School. After coordinating with the respective teachers at each school, we were able to develop a plan on how we could support them and their goals for their clubs.

At Oak Grove ES, we worked with 3rd-5th grade students on the concept of coding. We created a code for them and they were able to quickly crack it! They were all very sharp and have a knack for coding! By the end our time there that day, they were writing their own code to challenge other students in the club.

At Olive Chapel ES, the Podcast club was made up of eager and engaged 4th graders. Our initial meeting covered the basics of podcasting as well as our experience with it as DLCs. We were able to continue our support by assisting with the writing, recording, and editing of each groups’ podcast.

If you run a club and would like our support with integrating technology, please reach out to us!

Do you like designing presentations in Canva but also want to keep them in your Google Drive? You can (very easily) convert your Canva presentations into a Google Slides. This will allow allow you to integrate them into your Canvas course using the Google LTI function.

One of the ways we can support you is by co-planning a lesson with your PLC that has a focus on integrating technology into your curriculum. Some examples could be assisting with creating a news program, starting a classwide podcast, maker tools like Makey Makey, LEGO Spike Prime, Hummingbird and so many others.

At the end of last school year (’22-’23), we teamed up with the 5th grade PLC team at Salem Elementary School to integrate Root into their math curriculum. We communicated through emails to have a better understanding about the goals they had for their students, the unit they wanted to implement Root and how they were planning on assessing their students after this learning experience. This information helped us develop a learning experience with the goals they had in mind.

We started with an on-site consultation to teach the team of teachers how Root operates so they could first experience this tool as a student. Then, after reviewing the lesson we developed, we were ready for implementation day with the students!

Each teacher confidently led the lesson to their students as our team of DLCs assisted in areas that were needed. Engagement, rigor, creativity and collaboration was at an all-time high as students absolutely nailed the learning goals and had a blast doing it! Big shout-out to Ms. Heinze, Ms. Flynn and Ms. Patterson!